


ash upon a throne

by dakhtar



Series: fear the old flame (soulsborne fics) [2]
Category: Dark Souls (Video Games), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Crossover, FRIDAY as the firekeeper, Gen, JARVIS as not alive, Natasha as Ludleth, ULTRON as Iudex Gundyr, and more!, dark souls 3 fusion, featuring tony stark as andre the blacksmith, peter parker as the chosen undead/ashen one, the fluted armour set
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-02
Updated: 2019-11-02
Packaged: 2021-01-20 19:37:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21287069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dakhtar/pseuds/dakhtar
Summary: The fire fades, the age of fire grows colder, and Dark begins to settle in. But the bell tolls, and as before, the cycle begins anew. Unkindled, unfit even to be cinder, seeks embers.And all the while, Tony wipes the sweat from his brow, the heat of the forge burning on, until a new set of armoured feet clang their way into Firelink Shrine.( “I’m Peter!” A cherubic voice chirps (fuckingchirps!), the helmet lolling too fiercely for the child to the point that he needs to hold it steady with another hand. “The Firekeeper said I could ask you to please help fix my sword?”)
Relationships: Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Series: fear the old flame (soulsborne fics) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1748566
Comments: 2
Kudos: 30





	ash upon a throne

**Author's Note:**

> **prompt:** i distinctly remember tags of yours talking about dark souls/avengers fic. maybe with tony stark?
> 
> I HAVE NO REGRETS.

The place has been far too quiet for far too long. Only the clang of metal on metal, the burning stench of a roaring forge, and the slight static FRIDAY generates that he’s never been able to get rid of.

Outside, ULTRON remains still and silent save for the momentary clashes of battle, of yet another undead meeting the business end of his sword and turning Hollow.

Until, suddenly, ULTRON exists no more.

Tony pauses, muscles straining with the hammer in the air, his entire body seizing up from suddenly not doing what he’s been doing for ages. Looks up, eyebrows already rising in disbelief at the sudden silence, at the sudden absence of the corrupted guardian, at FRIDAY’s serene expression peering through the archway at him in return.

Huh. Who’d have thought. Someone actually beat ULTRON.

It’s still a bit of a trek from that clearing to the shrine, and there’s still an eternity of opportunities to meet one’s doom, so Tony’s not holding out for much, but _still_. Someone beat _ULTRON_. The guardian who’d been the shining beacon of all their hopes up until the corruption had set in, the guardian who Tony had slaved over, lovingly created with his own two hands, whispered his hopes and dreams into only to be met with Dark and Damnation.

The guardian who’d killed JARVIS, so long ago. Right in that very clearing.

His hands unstick, his body unlocks, and as FRIDAY turns away to tend to the dead bonfire, Tony returns to his work, banging the hammer down onto the sword, straightening it’s surface, perfecting it like all the sword’s before.

The Chosen Undead shall arrive when they are intended to arrive. Not a second sooner, not a second later.

And while ULTRON may have finally been defeated, Tony doubts the Chosen Undead will arrive any time soon.

And so he works instead.

#

There’s a commotion up ahead, past the long hallway that leads to the centre part of the shrine. He can’t see much but the silhouette of the bonfire itself, doesn’t really want to since he knows that centre part like the back of his hands, and returns to his smithing instead.

The forge is especially hot today for some reason, sweat beading across his skin and soaking into his waistband. He runs a sweaty forearm across an equally sweaty forehead, doing nothing to help the situation, and eyes the edge of the sword critically.

Not sharp enough, he decides, putting it back to the wheel.

The commotion up above dies down, a little, Lord Natasha’s dulcet tones echoing ever so faintly from her perch on her mismatched throne. He’d offered to pretty it up for her, once. To make it a seat worthy of her title, of her rank. But she’d turned him down gently, sadly, unable to look him in the eye.

He hasn’t offered again.

There’s the clang of metal feet up ahead - that crestfallen one, maybe? - more voices, words inaudible, before the feet make their way to him.

Tony takes his time holding the sword to the wheel, the echoing sparks dying before they reach him, his hands safely covered with thick leather gloves. Beneath the gloves, scars litter his hands, echoes from a time he’d gone without, from a time FRIDAY hadn’t sacrificed her existence to the duties of the shrine just to stay with him, for just a little bit longer.

The footsteps stop in front of him.

A throat clears itself. High pitched. Female? The Chosen Undead throughout the ages has been anything and everything in between; Lord Natasha proves that with her existence. But-

Shuffling of metal-clad feet. Awkwardly.

Tony’s lips twitch, amused despite himself, as he glances at the feet - not bad armour, he distantly notices; strong, dependable, but _old_ – and looks up, only to stare right into the face of a helmeted _child._

Tall, no doubt about it, _skinny_, because it’s a goddamn _child_, with a sword that looks five times too long for the brat’s twig-like arms.

Seriously? _This _is who finally stumbles their way to Firelink Shrine? _This _kid is the one that might, just _might_, link the flames and allow humanity to survive _just a little bit longer_?

Tony stares, flabbergasted, before blurting out, “Who the fuck are you?”

The kid struggles to heft the entire length of the sword, finally sheathing it before presenting it to Tony like a lollipop. “I’m Peter!” A cherubic voice _chirps_ (fucking _chirps!_), the helmet lolling too fiercely for the child to the point that he needs to hold it steady with another hand. “The Firekeeper said I could ask you to please help fix my sword?”

FRIDAY. _FRIDAY._

Tony’s going to _kill her_.

But goddammit, this is his job, isn’t it? He’s Tony the Blacksmith, forever linked with Firelink Shrine just as the Firekeeper is, just as that damn bonfire echoes across time and space in a way that still drives him mad.

So he takes the sword, doesn’t roll his eyes at the way the armour clad _child _perks up and flails excitedly, and unsheathes it, eyeing the metalwork appraisingly before actually giving in and _rolling his eyes_.

Because by the Gods, the kid’s running around with a damn _toothpick_.

“Look,” he sighs, sheathing the sword again, looking at the kid and his ridiculously old helmet, “You’re looking for the Lords of Cinder, right?”

The kid’s helmet almost falls off his head with the force of his nodding.

Tony doesn’t even _hide _rolling his eyes.

“I’m not gonna give you the whole ‘you’re not the first and probably not the last’ speech, especially if that piece of shit Hammer’s out there, but I will say this, so pay attention through that buckrucket you call a helmet.”

“Hey!” The pipsqueak squeaks. “This armour’s from my granddad, y’know!”

Odin have mercy, _this _was an Ashen One?

Tony snaps his fingers irritably, and the kid straightens up with a jolt. “If you’re actually thinking of doing this,” he grouses, waving an index finger around to indicate ‘_this’, _“Then even you gotta know you’ll need an actual weapon, kid.”

The boy has the gall to _cross his arms_. Odin’s beard, Tony can just hear Rhodey laughing himself sick from the afterlife.

“What’s wrong with my weapon?”

“What,” Tony snorts, “did you get it from your _grandma _this time?”

The kid’s stony silence is answer enough.

Tony actually (just a little bit!) feels a bit bad about that. But _still_.

“Look,” he sighs again, waving away his own animosity and the kid’s bristling, “You’ll find a whole bunch of stuff out there, if you keep a good eye out. Bring me anything that seems good along with some materials and I’ll do what I can. Same with the armour. That fluted set’s not too bad; loyal, won’t flake out on you in the middle of a fight, but it’s old for a reason. If you fall on your face with that thing on you’ll cut half your head off cleaner than your toothpick ever could.”

The kid _bristles_, but then-

stops.

Straightens up, _brightens_, and says, “So you’ll smith me weapons? And armour?! Oh my god, _seriously?_ Holy shit, the Firekeeper lady said you were rude on the outside but a softy on the inside and she was right, _yes_!” The kid pumps both hands into the air, before leaning in _far too close _into Tony’s personal space. “Can you make my current sword better for now, at least? I don’t want to change it, at least not if I don’t have to, and oh my armour too!”

What did the kid say his name is? Peter? (Who even gives out their actual name to a stranger? And Tony _knows _with the same certainty he knows his trade that it’s the kid’s real name too. _Idiot._)

He pulls the sword just a little bit past it’s sheath, unearthing it’s silver gleam, radiating in the light of his forge. It’s not necessarily a bad weapon, Tony admits, more of a starter weapon than anything else. Good to get someone to learn a thing or two before handing over a broadsword, that’s for sure. Long (too long) but thin, just like the toothpick he’d thought it to be, but also surprisingly heavy. Too heavy, actually, heavy enough that with the knowledge that it belonged to the kid’s grandma meant that it possible wasn’t a starter weapon after all, but a weapon someone loved, despite it’s many faults.

On second thought… this weapon might be for the best.

The kid, thinks Tony, Peter, is small. Small not in his stature (the kid’s pretty tall, actually, and no doubt still growing), but small in everything else. A weapon like this is probably the best for him, at least until he loses a bit of the baby fat clinging to his cheeks. He’s a _child_. Young and hopeful and far too innocent to be burnt alive for a short eternity until he can burn no longer.

… Tony doesn’t want the kid to be the fated Chosen Undead.

But Tony doesn’t get what he wants.

“No shit, kid,” he says instead, biting back the warning (plea) for the kid to go back, to go back to where he’d come from (impossible, as every Undead to roll through the Shrine always comes from the Graves). “That _is _my job, after all. Name’s Tony. Tony the blacksmith. Bring all your shit to me, and I’ll make it stronger. Won’t get a better blacksmith than me.”

And, later, after some time, as the kid straps on the upgraded sword to his waist, lighter and more manageable for his skinny little arms - as the kid tightens the straps of his better fitting armour, Tony says, “Better be careful out there, kid. I put effort into that shit. If you die and put my work to waste I’ll be pissed.”

_“Better not die and leave my babies out there on the battlefield for any ol’ scrub to put their dirty hands on, honeybear!”_

_“Do us both a favour and shut the fuck up, Tones.”_

_“That’s Lord Tones to you!”_

The fluted armour’s helmet has no flap to reveal the face, a flaw later rectified in later armours that took the norm. The dumb asymmetrical pauldrons took a nosedive out of fashion too, though Tony can’t help but be charmed by how dumb it still looks, even now, centuries later.

“I’ll be back, Mr. Tony!” The kid, Peter, chirps (_chirps!_ has the kid no _shame_?). “I’ll bring the materials you mentioned so you can make my stuff even better, so wait for me! Bye Mr. Tony!” And _flounces _off.

Lady Frigga’s left tit, that kid is _absolutely _going to die.

But maybe, Tony hopes with his stupidly hopeful clockwork heart, maybe he won’t.

Only time will tell.

**Author's Note:**

> THREE GUESSES WHO SIEGWARD OF CATARINA IS IN THIS FIC AND TWO OF THEM DON'T COUNT! \\[T]/


End file.
